1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to signaling a second radio network controller a measurement made in a first radio network controller and, more particularly, to a problem relating to interpretation of such signaling.
2. Discussion of Related Art
As a universal terrestrial radio access network (UTRAN) Release 4 proposal (see Change Request CR323 to 25.423 version 3.4.0 3GPP TSG-RAN 3 #19 Meeting Cardiff Wales, Feb. 23-Mar. 2, 2001), a source controller can report load information with a common measurement report on the Iur (see CR 323 Chapter 8.5.x. “Common Measurement Reporting” at pages 60-61). This load information has generic values (0 . . . 9) for the uplink and for the downlink (see CR 323 Table 9.2.1.x. at page 123). This value means, for example, 1=10% loaded, 4=40% loaded. The proposed change request to the specification does not define the generic load value, nor any particular action which the receiver should take with the received value. Each controller that receives this generic value can interpret this information in different ways, depending on the maker. For example, 40% could mean congestion in one controller while for a connected controller from another vendor this might not be considered congested. In addition, a generic value cannot report what type of congestion has occurred. It would be useful to know if it is interference, transport overload, or processing overload so that the receiving controller can better decide what it should do to solve the congestion situation. But in a multi-vendor environment, each vendor can define the value in a different way and each controller can analyze the value in a different way. This is fine for communicating between controllers made by the same vendor, but this doesn't work properly in a multi-vendor environment.
From the foregoing it will be appreciated that in the above described prior art there is a generic load value transferred between the controllers. There is no general solution for how the receiver should interpret this value, regardless of vendor.